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Shutdown message: Don't trust government

Exclusive: Joseph Farah warns of dire future if feds have power over all our health care

Joseph Farah is founder, editor and chief executive officer of WND. He is the author or co-author of 13 books that have sold more than 5 million copies, including his latest, "The Restitution of All Things: Israel, Christians, and the End of the Age." Before launching WND as the first independent online news outlet in 1997, he served as editor in chief of major market dailies including the legendary Sacramento Union.

Is it possible the government shutdown Barack Obama wanted so badly could result in his political undoing?

I don’t know if the American people are smart enough to see through this charade. But it is becoming more obvious by the day, the hour and the minute that attempting to close down open-air war memorials, taxpayer-built historical monuments, privately maintained historical sites, ports and even oceans has been bad PR for the White House.

Obama has also threatened already to withhold Social Security checks and to default on the country’s debt.

All of this is designed to do two things:

scare the American people;

make them feel some pain for Obama being deprived of what he wants.

But, at the end of the day, what is this conflict all about?

It’s about permanently nationalizing health care in the United States.

Think about that – and, I suspect, Americans are thinking about it more and more these days.

There’s an old adage that says, “What government gives it can take away.”

That’s why it’s important for Americans to understand that their basic rights are not gifts bestowed upon them by government. They are unalienable gifts. We are endowed with them by our Creator, as the founders explained.

The childish, predictable actions of Obama in scaring Americans and making them feel discomfort during this partial government shutdown only illustrate clearly to anyone with half a brain that this old adage is a truism that applies to the very source of this political showdown.

In some future conflict within government, how will Americans feel about being deprived of life-saving health care?

Harry Reid said he didn’t care about saving the lives of children battling cancer. He wouldn’t vote to fund the program. In a future dispute over what deserves funding and what doesn’t, is it hard to imagine another Harry Reid holding Americans hostage by using the government’s monopoly on health care and threatening to shut all medical services down?

It’s not hard to imagine at all.

It’s as predictable as clockwork if Americans make the mistake of giving Washington this power.

Again, are Americans discerning enough to see what’s happening now and project into the future how government’s stranglehold on health-care options might be used like a sledgehammer to get whatever the Washington power brokers want?

Obamacare could, if fully implemented, once and for all change the balance of power in the United States of America between government and the people.

Instead of being a government of the people, for the people and by the people, government would have monopoly power over life-and-death decisions it could hold over the head of its former bosses. Government officials would no longer be servants of the people, they would become their masters.

Do you think Americans are a little bit close to understanding the critical component of what’s at stake in this debate – and how it is evidenced by Obama’s desperate and sometimes shocking abuses of power to see that he gets what he wants?

Today, the government is shut down because of Obamacare. But, as a result of the conflict over Obamacare, we may be getting a glimpse into the future and the consequences of what the next government shutdown will cost all Americans.

Imagine the next government shutdown. Imagine the next fight over a debt-limit increase. Will Americans dare to say no to Washington in the future when they are dependent on government to see a doctor?

Better to say no now.

Better to keep it shut down than acquiesce into future dependency and serfdom.

This may be our last chance to preserve the U.S. as a unique and lasting experiment in self-government, limited government, the rule of law and the will of the people.

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